The Salmon Parade/Transcript

WORK IN PROGRESS; NEEDS HUMAN REVIEW

Set

of living-room furniture.

[ gunshots ]

[ glass shatters ]

harold: He's warm,

he's cuddly, he's furry,

and he hangs around

in the forest.

I guess that's why they call him

a possum.

Put your hands together

more than once

for the star of our show,

mr. Red green!

Mr. Red green!

Whoo!

Thank you very much.

Uh, thank you for tuning us in,

and if you do see something

that you don't like,

just blame harold,

especially if it is harold.

Wa-a-a-a!

Well, uncle red,

as the director/producer,

I take all the blame.

Of course,

I also take all the credit.

[ keyboard clacking ]

wa-a-a!

Well, I think you just exceeded

your credit limit there, harold.

Big, big week at the lodge

this week.

The salmon are running

in mercury creek.

Old man sedgwick says

that that's the first fish

that he's seen in there

in living memory,

which is amazing,

because living and memory

are two things

he doesn't have a lot left of.

Wow, that's amazing.

Mercury creek's really making

a comeback

ever since they closed

the paper mill.

Yeah.

Oh, you know, and of course

the asbestos mine

and, you know, then the paint

factory and the oil refinery.

Yeah, yeah.

Who says free trade hasn't been

good for us, eh, harold?

Who needs jobs?

We got salmon, right?

You can't eat jobs.

Wa-a!

'course, you can't eat

that salmon, though, either.

But we wanted to have

some kind of an event, you know,

to commemorate

the return of the salmon.

Oh, please,

not a salmon feast.

Oh, you don't want to put one of

those salmons in your mouth.

Oh, that does not make

for good eating, I'll tell you.

All that mercury.

Might make a good thermometer,

though.

Yeah, and you still wouldn't

have to stick 'em in your mouth.

No, no.

Uh, we're thinking more of,

uh, having a salmon parade,

you know?

We're gonna have a parade

that'll go right from possum

lodge all the way into town,

and, of course, the theme

of the parade will be...Salmon.

Good.

Yep.

So we're telling all the

participants to make something

that kind of captures the spirit

of the salmon in mercury creek.

Well, I guess there's gonna be

lots of floats, then. [ laughs ]

[ spoons and guitar playing ]

♪ in murphy's bush,

the trees are tall ♪

♪ with moss and fungus

on them all ♪

♪ murphy's bush

has brambles, too ♪

♪ with shoots and roots

and swamp and goo ♪

♪ I may pull,

and you may push ♪

♪ but it's really, really hard

to drag a dead moose ♪

♪ through murphy's bush ♪

this week on "handyman corner,"

we're gonna talk

about recycling.

Now, we got an old car here

that, uh, ordinarily

would be ready for the dump,

or as we call it at the lodge,

the mall.

But, uh, instead of just

rolling this into a ravine

or ferrying it somewhere

or trying to sell it

on that home rip-off channel,

we're gonna show you how you can

do a little recycling

and, uh, turn this old car

into a whole houseful

of fine furniture.

For example, there's a couple

of good-looking seats in there.

And now what we have is

a real nice living-room couch.

And the backseat here becomes,

of course, a matching love seat.

Finally,

a love seat with proof.

And, you know,

there's other stuff

that you can get out of a car.

Like, I look over here,

and I say, "well, by golly,

there's a couple of nice lamps

there."

and how about this bumper?

Wouldn't that make just

an excellent fireplace grill?

You know, if you like

scandinavian furniture,

you could do this with, say,

a volvo or a saab.

Or if you wanted lawn furniture,

use a lada.

Well, is this cozy or what?

I got the headlights

hooked up here,

and got the jumper cables

running across to the battery,

and, uh, what you can do is, uh,

hook up a high-beam switch,

and, uh, fire on to high beams

when you want to read

the tv guide.

And here's another bonus

that you get.

You hang this

on your front door,

and you got yourself a really

unique, interesting doorbell.

[ honking ]

and you know you're thinking,

"wouldn't a little music go good

now?"

well, how about the car radio?

[ music plays ]

you were gonna throw

that thing out,

and it comes with

a built-in stereo system

with built-in speakers.

Take a look at that.

We get moose thompson

to lie down

and wedge his head between those

and put on some clogging music,

he practically

kicks the walls down.

Ah, it's a great setup.

Seating for everybody,

and we got the great fireplace

setup here with the bumper,

but to me, now it just screams

for a coffee table --

something that you can put

the tv converter on

the odd time when you do

actually set it down.

Let's get ourselves

a coffee table.

Now, to me, the roof would make

an ideal coffee table,

so step one

is to remove the roof.

Actually,

that's the only step.

Now, you can use a saw

with that

or one of those electric knives

or what have you,

or just wait till it rusts off,

but I don't have

that kind of time,

so I like using

the oxyacetylene cutting torch.

And these, to me --

I've been messing with these

for years, and they just --

they're a very effective tool.

But you got to protect

your eyes, of course.

I think I started using these

when I was around

10, 11, 12, 13.

I guess I was around 6 or 7.

Well, that's not working

too good, so I'll just --

I got a lighter here.

I'll just get that going.

[ sniffs ]

boy, you can sure smell

that acetylene.

Where's the torch?

I'll just --

where is that torch?

[ explosion ]

all right, uh, that's got her.

[ air whistling ]

oh, here she comes now --

free delivery.

[ crash ]

and to think you were gonna

throw this stuff out, huh?

Remember, until next time,

if women

don't find you handsome,

they should

at least find you handy.

Ah, this is great, isn't it?

[ coughs ]

and now it's time to expose

those three little words

that men find so difficult

to say -- "I don't know."

wa-a-a-a!

And here once again

to prove that point

on the expert portion

of our program

is my uncle red and his

good friend mr. Glen braxton.

Okay.

"dear experts,

my brother is gay."

"my brother is gay, and

I tried to talk him out of it,

"but he says

he was born this way.

How can I get him to

straighten out and fly right?"

what are you guys

looking at me for?

I'm an expert on boats

and r.V.S, not --

yeah, I know, glen.

Well, I just thought that maybe,

you know, you could, uh --

no, I got --

red, I'm married.

I got seven kids.

I got seven kids at home,

pal.

I know.

I just thought --

I thought you just would be,

you know, more comfortable

with the, uh --

hey, I don't think you got

any kids, do you, red?

You don't have any kids.

Go ahead, feel that.

Feel that.

Go ahead --

right there.

Come on.

No, feel it.

Come on.

Here, feel that.

I'd rather not.

I lift outboard motors

every day. Don't tell me.

All right, all right.

I just thought you'd be --

you'd feel more comfortable.

You got the kids, you know,

and everything.

You're so masculine,

I thought you'd be fine.

Yeah, you bet.

Mind you, glen, you know,

your kids are all girls.

So?

Excuse -- I just think

what my uncle is trying to say

in his primitive, uh,

politically uncorrect way,

is that, you know, being

the father of seven daughters,

perhaps you'd be more in touch

with your feminine side

than the other guys

around here.

Whoa, whoa, feminine side,

harold?

I don't have

a feminine side.

I got two sides --

front and back --

and they're both masculine,

okay?

Okay, well --

for god's sake,

don't try to prove it for us.

Look, all right, if you're

uncomfortable with this --

I'm not uncomfortable.

No. No.

I wish there was more gay guys

in the world.

Sure.

Then I wouldn't have to watch my

teenage daughters like a hawk.

Okay.

Um, I think we've offended

everybody

with any sensitivity now,

so why don't we just

wrap this up?

No, no, no, no.

I can answer this.

No, I mean,

you can't talk somebody

out of being gay,

you know?

See, it's biological.

Live and let live.

Do what you want to do,

you know?

Just mind

your own business.

Wow.

Cool answer, mr. Braxton.

Boy, I wish more guys around

here had sensitivity like you.

Wa-a-a!

Why's that, harold?

No! No! No way!

Feel that.

Feel that.

Come on.

[ grunting ]

red: What do you call that club,

bob -- tree iron?

I thought we might need some

kind of a permit, you know,

to have our salmon parade,

so I went over to talk

to bob stuyvesant about that,

'cause he works

for the government,

and another thing is

it's easy to find bob

'cause you know he's always

on the golf course.

Now, he claims he's actually

working there --

you know, he's taking

air-temperature readings

and the soil humidity and wind

and weather and stuff --

and that the golf

is actually just a fake.

This golf thing

is just a cover.

If any polluters see me,

then they just figure

I'm just another golfer.

Unless they see you golf.

So how's the air temperature

and soil humidity today, bob?

What?

Oh [sniffs]

you know, seems fine.

I'm more concerned

with thinning trees today, red.

Let me get

out of your way here.

[ air whistles ]

[ pop! ]

yeah, there's another one

that's got to come down.

Oh, my gosh.

Doing a little excavating, too,

are you, bob?

Gonna build a subdivision

in that divot?

Aerating, red.

It's the best way to get oxygen

into the soil.

All right.

Listen, maybe you'd like to join

me in my game of golf.

You can -- you can play

from where I lie.

That way, it would help

with your recovery shots.

Oh, no.

I'm not -- I'm not as good

a golfer as you, bob.

I could never recover

from your lies.

But, you know,

I did want to ask you,

do we need a permit

to have our salmon parade?

I don't think so.

You're not expecting

a big crowd, are you?

Oh, no.

I mean, there's only 50 guys

in the lodge,

and most of them

are in the parade,

so I would say under 1,000.

Could even be under 10.

Uh, red, could you -- could you

help me look for my ball?

Oh, sure.

Went in here, I think.

Oh, never mind.

Found it.

It's right here.

You sure, bob?

There's a ball back here

behind this rock.

It's a super dot 3.

What are you hitting?

This one.

No, you're not.

Well, the parade to celebrate

the return of salmon

to, uh, mercury creek is on.

Everybody's building a float.

Uh, buster hadfield

completely redid his truck.

It looks like a truck now.

And, uh, moose thompson

is helping me.

We duct-taped one of them

above-ground pools

to the roof of the possum van.

We're gonna paint her all red

and go as a giant can

of pacific salmon.

Stinky peterson

didn't know what to do

that would capture the true

essence of a salmon, you know,

so junior singleton -- he

suggested that maybe, you know,

stinky just stand downwind

of himself for a minute.

[ laughs ]

well, stinky took exception

to that remark.

So now junior's entering

the salmon parade as a sockeye.

Yeah.

Well, of course, you know,

I'm gonna be the grand marshal

of the parade,

and I'll be leading everybody

in single file

from possum lodge right down

to memorial park,

where we'll hear a speech

by the mayor.

Then we'll all wake up

and have a party.

What are you gonna do

for the parade, harold?

I'm going

as a one-man band.

That'd be pretty much the story

of your life, would it not?

I'm gonna go

as one of those guys

who crank the calliope,

you know,

and the monkey jumps around

on the string and everything.

Well, that sounds kind of cute,

harold.

Not really anything to do

with salmon, but okay.

Let me know if you need me to be

the guy cranking the calliope.

Okay.

[ spoons and guitar playing ]

♪ 99 bottles

of beer on the wall ♪

♪ 99 bottles of beer ♪

♪ I don't care

what anybody says ♪

♪ it's my den, I'll decorate it

the way I want ♪

[ film projector clicking ]

red: This is a little safety tip

this week.

If you're ever out

in the long grass,

be awful careful bending over

to pick anything up when, say...

Aah!

...Somebody's coming along

in a van.

But, uh, we know we're happy

that this served its purpose

in showing you,

you know, what not to do

in the long grass.

We want to show you everything

not to do in the long grass.

You okay, there, bill?

Oh, yeah.

He's all right?

[ groans ]

wow, he was grilled

for questioning.

[ clears throat ]

all right, so,

his nose is back crooked,

the way it should be,

and he's looking --

no, he dropped his shears.

'cause bill's plan this week

was he wanted to cut the lawn

out in the back of the lodge,

and, man,

that hasn't been cut --

whoa!

Oh. Oh.

Wow.

Slippery stuff out there.

And the good news

is he found the shears.

Oh.

Oh. Well, that's -- well, they

call them a pair of shears.

Now you got two singles.

Now, look at that.

Oh, yeah, like the old days --

the old ways, the old days.

Oh, that brings back

a lot of --

a lot of feelings

from my grandaddy.

Oh, look at that.

The scythe.

You know,

the old scythe and sickle?

Sickle scythe?

Scythe sickle?

Whoop, whoop, whoop, whoop.

No, bill, you don't --

oh, careful now.

Careful, careful, careful.

Wow, she's in the clay here.

So sticky and -- give her

a good hoist there, pal.

Oh, oh, oh!

[ air whistles ]

the blade is --

no, no, bill.

There's no blade on that,

bill.

Blade -- bill.

The blade's -- bill?

It's missing, but it'll -- it'll

be back in a minute there, bill.

Just -- just stand about

right there.

Hold your arms out.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,

yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

There it is.

Yeah, came out of the sky, bill.

Yeah.

That blade came out of the sky.

Yeah, yeah.

Oh, yeah, that's right.

Yeah, yeah.

Oh, it's too late now, bill.

It missed you.

So now he says, "all right,

let's mechanize the thing."

this is a gas lawn mower,

and you know the darn things --

a lot of times,

they take 700 or 800 pulls.

But bill's got that figured.

What he did was he put a real

long pull rope on that thing.

There he goes.

And -- and -- and --

get her going.

One more. One more. One more.

One more. One more!

[ motor starts ]

yeah, that's it. That's it.

Oh, oh!

By golly, it's one of those

self-driven ones.

Excellent.

Uh, we'll catch you later, bill.

Well, that didn't work out,

so then he brought out

one of them electrical --

now, to me, the electric mower

just doesn't have

the power of the gas.

Oh, bill, I don't think --

it's just not --

you know, they don't --

they just -- yeah.

Exactly.

Exactly. Exactly.

That's not gonna do it.

Now what are we gonna do?

Oh, look who's coming through.

Yeah, we'll wait here, bill.

What's he gonna do?

Just --

oh, taking the handle off.

What do you want the handle for,

bill?

It's already got a handle

on the electric one.

You don't need --

oh, for gosh sakes.

Okay.

Okay.

Gonna mount the other handle

on there,

and you got a handle

on each end, and now we can --

yeah, we can pick her up,

and that way,

we can cut the higher --

oh, of course.

So I click her on there,

and this is --

but, you know, instead of

the thing coming down,

it actually started

going up.

Now, let her go.

Let her go, bill.

Let her go.

Let her go!

Bill! Bill! Bill!

Hang on. Hang on.

Hang on. Hang on.

The wire's going.

You got to think fast.

You got to think fast.

I'll just unplug that, and maybe

that'll bring him down.

Is there a chance that

that's gonna bring him down?

Is there -- is there --

is there -- is there --

yeah, yeah.

Uh, he's okay.

Gosh, we haven't cut

a lot of lawn yet, there, bill.

You all right?

Yeah?

No, we're over here.

Over here. Over here.

There you go.

He seems okay.

We won't cut the lawn.

We'll just flatten it.

This next part of the show is,

uh, for all the kids who watch,

and they tell me

there's a lot of you.

But I think by the end of this

segment, there may not be any.

Hi. Uh, well, welcome

to the youth-oriented

portion of the show,

or as we like to say in the biz,

the interesting part.

I'm harold,

and today's topic is...

Okay, stag dancing.

You know,

not this kind of stag.

Not like a male deer

or something.

Stag dancing, okay?

Stag dancing

is perfectly acceptable

as long as nobody knows.

Harold,

no one knows and no one cares.

Au contraire, uncle red.

Au contraire.

You see,

because we single teens

are always looking for ways

to fit in and be accepted,

so here's the secret

to stag dancing.

If you see two girls

at a social function,

and they're dancing together

as girls so often

are apt to do --

but anyway, what you do

is you just sidle on up in there

and you start dancing

right with them, you know?

And from the casual observer's

point of few,

he'll think

you're a real stud.

[ chuckles ]

that's spelled "d-u-d."

anyway, the same deal goes if

it's a guy and a girl dancing.

You just get in there

real close,

and many observers

won't even see the guy.

Wa-a-a-a-a!

And what about the observers

who can't see the girl?

They'll think you're dancing

with another guy, harold.

Well, then --

well, avoid the slow songs.

No kidding.

I wonder if that's why

I got punched.

Oh, harold,

could be a million reasons.

See what I mean?

Oh, ho ho.

I know I can't expect you

teenagers to do well in school

or to have some manners

or to back off

on the looting and rioting,

but I would have thought

you had the brainpower

to figure out which way a cap

is supposed to go on.

Now, this part here -- the hard

part -- is the peak, okay?

And its job is to keep

the weather off your face,

because up until

this generation,

that was the most valuable side

of a person's head.

When you wear the peak

on the side,

somebody's liable

to come up to you

and whisper

right into your nose.

And if they've just eaten

at a vietnamese restaurant,

that could be serious.

So wear the peak

the way it's supposed to be,

not to the side or in the back,

'cause that looks like you don't

know which way you're going,

and that shouldn't happen

till you're at least 30.

I was hoping dougie franklin

would lead the parade

with his monster truck,

but he had other plans.

He wanted to turn this old car

of his into a great, big fish.

Put this in here like this.

A little bit of spot welding.

I get, like, a hook hanging out

of the fish's mouth.

Okay. I see.

That's your fish hook.

You ready

for the pièce de résistance?

I think I am, doug.

Paint her pink,

hang her on there.

Yeah.

What do you got?

Worm?

You got your worm.

Absolutely.

So, I'm thinking, you know...

Well, I think maybe harold --

harold could drive

old zelda here.

Oh, no, no, no.

Thanks anyway, doug.

I mean, harold doesn't even have

his driver's license.

Oh, you don't need

a driver's license for a parade.

You just need a big baby

like this up front

in case you run

into another parade

or a funeral or something.

Or a parade

that turns into a funeral.

Oh, you got to live on the edge,

red.

I do.

Right on.

Well, this whole salmon parade

thing ran into a few snags.

Wa-a!

Snags? Snags?!

I think it ran into

a lot more than that.

Wa-a-a-a!

Well, in hindsight,

I think it might have been

the parade route.

It was a 20-mile-long,

winding dirt road into town,

which was populated by --

I believe I counted

three people...

Two of whom

were hitchhiking.

And so,

after the first mile,

uh, a few of the guys

started to fidget.

I love this.

Fidget. Is that what

you call it -- fidget?

Well, that's what I told

the cops.

Uh, it started

when junior singleton

tried to pass stinky peterson

'cause he couldn't stand

the fumes

coming off his truck,

you know --

or the fumes coming off

his shirt, either.

So then junior and stinky

started to jockey for position.

Then, of course,

old man sedgwick,

you know,

didn't want to be lapped.

And at that point, it got

a little out of control,

and the whole parade

kind of sped up a tad.

Yeah, I -- I think when

you broke the speed limit,

it technically

no longer was a parade.

No, no.

And, of course,

a lot of the --

a lot of the floats were built

for the slower speeds,

so, you know,

the plywood

and the cardboard

started flying off.

You know, pretty soon, it was

more of an obstacle course,

motocross kind of a thing.

And then, you know, when stinky,

junior, and moose all came,

you know, slamming

into that one-lane bridge

over mercury creek there,

it sort of became

a demolition-derby thing.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Anyway, I mean, all insurance

claims aside and everything,

I think

it came out pretty even.

But, of course, we could

no longer make it into town,

so I canceled

the salmon parade.

Wa-a!

You had to.

You had to cancel it.

After the crash,

all the gas, oil,

and transmission fluid

hit mercury creek.

The salmon saw it, did a quick

180 back to open water.

Wa-a-a!

Out of there!

[ screeching ]

oh, that's the possum.

That means we got a meeting,

uncle red.

Yeah, yeah.

All right, harold.

You go ahead and go down there,

harold.

Okay.

I'll be down in a minute.

All righty.

Well, usually,

I love a parade,

but I can't say I had

a lot of feeling for this one.

If my wife is watching,

uh, I'll be coming straight home

after the meeting,

and I told the guys

that they can keep all

their floats in our driveway

until they stop smoldering.

So, you might want to close

the living-room drapes

for a couple of weeks.

And to the rest of you,

on behalf of myself and harold

and the whole gang

out here at possum lodge,

thanks for watching,

and keep your stick on the ice.

[ screeching ]

all rise.

All:

Quando omni flunkus, moritati.